Creatures of Love
by lennongrad
Summary: After a disastrous mission leaves both Agent Three and Agent Eight stranded in a vacant land, they must protect one another to survive and find their way out. Their own failings will lead them to question themselves as the possibility of surviving seems more and more slim, and only their friendship, and love for one another, will keep them alive.
1. Falling

At a bridge, over the spiraling Octo Drop, an explosion. Grand lights flashing as the bridge sways before breaking into thousands of pieces under the pressure, newly unable to support its weight.

The bridges inhabitants yell as they are dropped, supportless, into the ravine below. Two of them, best friends, reach out for one another, but miss.

Bright lights rush by. Falling, falling, and gaining velocity. They tumble without hope deeper and deeper, feeling as if it will never stop - barely able to make out anything, or anyone, as they go.

She sees the ground. It grows closer.

Splat.

….

A large pile of rubble amidst the ruins of a deep, lost city is perturbed as an arm reaches out of it. The arm pulls its owner out, a heavily battered Inkling with long, green hair, a pierced nose, and perhaps most importantly, countless scars over her body.

This is Agent Three of the Squidbeak Splatoon.

As she removes herself slowly from the carnage, deep green ink pours from her wounds. She clutches at them meekly, using all her remaining strength to try and keep the ink in. She is certainly safe - ink loss is rarely fatal unless large amounts are lost, and she can recover eventually - but she feels better masking her wounds.

Agent Three is understandably befuddled by her surroundings. Her vicinity resembles neither that of a normal Inkling or Octarian city; rather, it looks just like a human settlement. Of course, she is well read on the history of humanity, as were her friends. The incidents back in the Deepsea Monorail left them all curious about the creators of the station. Still, to see actual, mostly surviving human ruins is unheard of.

She is not entirely able to appreciate this, however; her wounds are a much more pressing issue. They would likely take several days to recover, and Agent Three was not known for being particularly patient. She can't take the wait, and begins to slowly crawl down from the pile of rubble, quietly whimpering through her pain

It dawns on her that she truly has no idea where she is. In fact, she has no recollection of anything in the past days at all.

Agent Three begins to peer into the distance, toward what could be described as a horizon, despite being fully subterranean. Small amounts of light peer out from far away, likely artificial. Tilting her head as directly upwards as she could, she is barely able to see a skinny slit of light. Likely, the surface.

She begins to remember, again, back to her experience with the Deepsea Metro, being stranded underground, and having to free Agent Eight and Cap'n Cuttlefish. She wonders if getting back up to the surface this time would be just as hard, or if-

How could she forget?

Agent Eight, her best friend, had been with her. Oh, she remembered now… they had been on a mission, up above the Octo Drop, when they had plummeted. She hated herself. Agent Three hated herself for forgetting Agent Eight. Eight could be anywhere right now, injured or worse… and yet she had waited for hours trying to heal.

She should've started searching for her immediately.

Of course, some deep part of her knows that waiting to heal is safer, that she needed all her strength. But Agent Eight… is so important. Ever since they escaped the Metro, they had been working together, doing missions to try and stop further tragedies. Agent Eight couldn't exactly transition easily into Inkling society, so they had even lived together. How on Earth did she forget about her?

Agent Three rushes away from the rubble towards an opening in the buildings nearby. Her rushing, though, is closer to a walk, having to drag her mangled right leg behind her. Every so often she has to pause to catch her breath and then forces herself to continue.

She doesn't know what she would do if anything happened to Eight. As she pushes herself further, she recalls her last couple of months working with Agent Eight. They were perfect partners - as Agents, of course. They were only friends. Agent Three has to keep reminding herself of that. And Eight was always watching out for her, trying to protect her. Three returns the favor, now and then. So she will push on, even if she has to drag her leg. Even if she is beginning to lose feeling in her left foot.

She would do it, for her.


	2. Tape Deck

Agent Eight wakes to the noise of a whirring machine. She carefully opens her eyes and turns her head to investigate her surroundings, attempting to be subtle in her movements.

As she looks, she sees numerous large chunks of machinery nearby, many clearly defunct. Some, however, are certainly alive, with their bits and bobs turning and moving in perfect rhythm. None of them seem particularly hostile; in fact, she is not sure they are even capable of causing her harm if they wanted to.

So, she begins to try and lift herself from the ground and her belly-down position. She feels immense difficulty moving her arms, however, including a sharp, shooting pain from her wrist. It is only now that she notices how battered her body is; much of it is deeply cut and scratched, and some parts, like her wrist, have deep gashes. Ink is pouring out all over her.

She tries again and again to lift herself up, but the pain is simply unbearable. In her current state, moving at all is almost impossible. She decides to stay put, waiting for her inky form to heal so she can move again. Her time in the Deepsea Metro had trained her for long, uneventful periods of time like this, where she could do nothing but lay down.

Really, that experience had shaped her in many ways. Eight had grown hardy, able to tackle tough situations. This is shown in her skills with the Octoshot, as well as in her emotional guardedness. Of course, being mute already gave her that burden; many are unwilling to give her the time of day due to her inability to talk, and being alone for so much of her life (at least, so much of it that she can remember) forged her into a deeply unsocial creature.

As she lays there, her mind wanders. She questions herself. Does she mind being alone? No, not really, she thinks. Plus, she isn't totally alone: she has her friend, Agent Three. Three always sticks by her. Of course, Three isn't very personable herself, and so Eight often wonders how much Three really likes her. Eight thinks back to the incident on the bridge, where it was almost like Three had given her the cold shoulder. Had she done something wrong? She didn't want to-

Suddenly, Eight remembers everything that happened. The explosion, the fall. Most importantly, she remembers Agent Three. Where is Three now?

Eight peers around cautiously, looking for any trace of Three. She can't see a single speck of ink, or any other indication of where her… her friend might be. Her best friend, she thinks. At least in Eight's mind, that is. Of course, Agent Three might not even like her! What if she was just being nice to her out of pity? Agent Eight has so few other friends, and Three is so caring, and so nice... surely, it is just out of pity. What does Eight have to offer?

Suddenly, one of the machines begins to whir much louder than before, shocking Agent Eight back into focus. She quickly turns as best she can to see it. The reason for the noise amplifying is clear: the machine has begun to transform. Before, it had simply been a large machine reading a long width of magnetic tape, but each of its individual parts are now tossing and shifting, morphing it into something much larger.

One spindle switches into a leg, while another forms more. Slowly each change in parts causes it to look less like the tape reader of an old television station and more like a large, spindly robot, suddenly towering over the other machines nearby.

Agent Eight is terrified. She knows she had to do something, but the pain is overwhelming. She notices her Octoshot nearby, laying on the ground in battered condition, but she simply can not move to grab it.

She is frozen.

As the machine finishes its transformation, it begins to move its legs back and forth, stomping loudly on the ground, each thud shaking Agent Eight to the core, and each movement causing a large, foghorn-esque sound to erupt from within the contraption.

Stomp. Stomp.

Agent Eight shakes and shakes her body in an attempt to move her body like a caterpillar away, but it is all in vain.

Stomp. Stomp.

It inches ever closer.

Agent Eight begins to cry.

She is ready to accept it, to take her death. She had never really been able to enter Inkling society, to become free. She wouldn't have been accepted. After all she had done to escape the Metro, she would die under the ground, even deeper than the Metro was, without having felt freedom. And she would die without ever having said goodbye to her friend, to the one person who ever seemed understand: Agent Three.

The machine readies its next step. It is so close. Next, it would step on her. Crush her. Destroy her. She knows it.

It raises its leg.

A loud scream rings throughout the vicinity as a figure blurs past Agent Eight's field of vision, ramming into the machine. It is toppled, slamming into the ground, beginning to make even louder whirring noises as various appendages suddenly appear from out of the machine, pushing against the ground in an effort to turn the horrible robot upright.

Agent Eight looks up at the blur that had saved her, now standing on the ground. The blur takes shape as dust clears. Eight sees the body of a strong, toned Inkling, bent out of shape, with various scars and bruises just like herself. She locks eyes with the green-haired Inkling.

Looking back at her is Agent Three.

Before Agent Three turns away, Eight can't help but smile. Her friend is safe! She saved Eight! And Three, despite all the scars, still has those beautiful auburn eyes, and that soft face. Agent Eight's face blushes a light purple, glad that Three can't see. Agent 8 would be so embarrassed if Agent 3 knew how she felt about her in this dangerous moment

Three quickly picks up the Octoshot from off the ground and begins to fire it at the joints of the machine, causing its new appendages to fail. It makes several angry noises before causing the tape reels to spin again. Suddenly, several tape ends come flying off the machine at Agent Three. She marvelously dodges each one, making sure they won't fly behind her and hit Eight.

Thinking the barrage is done, having destroyed each appendage with ink, Agent Three begins to turn around to check on Eight. As she does so, however, one last reel barrels towards her. Agent Eight tries to warn Three, but she is unable to; without the ability to move her arms, she cannot sign. Agent Three is struck by the tape, which begins to wrap around her.

After entrapping Three, the tape winds back up, pulling her back towards the machine. Meanwhile, the robot begins to uncover a gaping maw with sharp teeth, like that of an Octostamp. The teeth clamp down and up, forming a chomping motion. Just as Agent Three is about to be pulled into the mouth, she frees her arms and shoots several shots into the mouth, gumming it up. She then accelerates herself towards the machine and kicks it, knocking it backwards.

The machine, newly jammed with Ink, begins to sputter sparks, before erupting into flames. Slowly the fire dies as the various pieces of the machine falls apart and the tape disintegrates.


	3. Doubt

Agent Three gets down on her knees beside Eight, examining her body. She is looking at scars and wounds, seeing if anything is too serious. For cephalopods like them, these injuries are never too serious; a few days will heal them. Still, it pays to be cautious.

Agent Eight, meanwhile, finds it hard to look Three straight on. Eight is ashamed. She failed to protect herself and Three. Agent Three could've died saving her! The only thing in the world that Eight wanted was to protect her friend, her best friend, and she couldn't. Once they get out of here, she probably won't be able to look her in the face again.

"Please show me what hurts the most," mutters Three softly. Eight responds by lightly raising her arms. She then asks, "Is it too hard to sign?", and Eight answers by nodding yes.

Three gently wraps her arms around Eight, who winces in pain at the contact, and then carries her over to the corner of the room they are in. She apologizes with "Sorry, I know it hurts..", but Eight is almost more worried about seeming unappreciative. In her eyes, Three has already done way more than she deserves.

As if she deserves anything.

None of Eight's endless self doubt is conveyed to her friend, who begins to shift various items nearby around to create a temporary hideout of sorts. She pushes two blocks made of soft material to make a small bed, then lifts Eight onto it.

"There's only enough for one… I'll have to sleep on the ground. You should have this, since you're so injured" declares Three, hoping that she doesn't come off as sarcastic. Of course Eight deserves this, after all that happened! Eight nearly died, and Three doesn't know what she would do if that happened. Of course, it was not the first near death experience for either of them, but this one was particularly harrowing.

Eight cannot bear the thought of making Three sleep on the ground after saving her life, and adamantly forces out a sign in spite of all the pain.

"Sleep… here"

"I… I don't need it as much as you. But I know you'll just argue if I deny it, and there's no way I'm letting you sign any more with all your injuries. But just know I'm only doing this for you!"

Three finally lays down in the bed after making an act of it. Of course, she did really want to lay down on something comfortable after all that fighting, but that desire was fully outweighed by all the… the… admiration she had for Eight. The friendship, of course. And that friendship makes it hard for her to let Eight lay on the ground in her stead.

So, obviously, they both share the bed.

Agent Three lays down next to Eight, making sure to be careful and not knock her off. She faces away from Eight, putting her back near Eight's, but not so close that they're touching. They can't lay facing towards her because that would be awkward between friends. Plus, Three didn't want Eight to see her blushing.

"Goodnight Eight…" whispers Three.

Both of them try hard to fall asleep. For Eight, it is not so difficult, and she falls quickly into slumber. Unfortunately for Three, it isn't so easy, and Eight's loud snoring only makes it worse. Not that it isn't cute.

The combination of not having a blanket and the cold, damp breeze of the deep ruins they are sleeping in makes for an uncomfortable rest. Three struggles to stay sleeping as she rolls from nightmare to nightmare, with a few minutes of consciousness in between. Eventually, she gives up trying to sleep, and lays quietly in the darkness.

After hours and hours of staying as still as possible in the darkness, trying her hardest not to wake Agent Eight, Three can barely take it anymore. Her head is filled with a never ending wave of thoughts about where they are, the mysteries, the danger, and most importantly, worries about what might have happened if she hadn't appeared in time to save Eight.

She begins to argue with herself internally, trying desperately to prove to herself somehow that everything was fine, and that everything had been fine.

"There aren't any respawn points for miles… there's no way her ghost could've made it back to one in time. She would've died, and it would've been your fault, Three"

"No! I made it, and that's what counts! I saved her when no one else could've."

"She didn't even deserve to be in that position in the first place! Who's fault was it that you were both on the bridge that day? Certainly not Eight's!"

"She chose to go with me! I don't know why she ever wanted to be around me again after I snapped at her on the last mission, but she did. Maybe I can blame her for trusting me so much!"

"So I can admit that I can't be trusted!"

Agent Three fails to convince herself of much, other than how worthless she thinks she is. As she continues to argue, she begins to cry soft tears, which become even harder until she is bawling her eyes out. Her thoughts become jumbled, until the only things she can think about are all the different ways she has messed up and put Eight in danger in the past.

"No… no… I'm sorry… I'm sorry Eight" mumbles Three as tears fall and she rocks back and forth on her side of the bed.

Suddenly, Three feels a warmth on the back of her torso and a weight against the back of her head. Without turning her head, she can tell that Eight has turned around and is now leaning up against her. Despite this, she is still snoring. As far as Three can tell, Eight has done this completely subconsciously.

Three stops crying. Before long, she falls back asleep, and doesn't wake up again for hours.


	4. Practice

Agent 8 is the first to wake up in the morning. Her wounds have healed somewhat, and she is now more than able to stretch and get up. Moving still hurts a great deal, but she is far from immobile.

She carefully shifts to a sitting position on the bed, and stares off into the distance. On the horizon, she notices large pieces of machinery going back and forth, working in tandem with one another, as well many cable cars moving up and down the wall of the ravine.

A way back home.

Although Eight is excited, she doesn't want to wake Agent Three up yet. She knows Three deserves the sleep after saving her, risking her life for her own. So she sits there, staring off towards what she hopes is salvation.

Waiting, waiting, for hours. Agent Eight knows that she is patient, but couldn't she be doing something more effective?

She doesn't want to be a burden anymore. She couldn't do anything to help her friend destroy that machine. So she would train. She decides that she would train until Agent Three woke, and impress her with how strong she had grown.

So she sets off with the Octoshot towards a building nearby with a large array of windows on the front. The windows' sheen would be enough to stop ink from clinging to it, allowing her to use them as reusable targets. As she walk over towards the building, she feels a burning sensation from her hand. She soon finds that gripping the Octoshot is difficult, as tightening her palm leads to further pain. Still, she can endure.

Once Eight finally reaches the front of the building, she takes her time to analyze its full structure. It has a strict pattern of three windows in a row, then four with slightly varying heights, then three again, forming 10 total floors. She can just barely reach the top with the Octoshot standing on the ground.

Her plan is to hit each window on a row before moving upwards to the next, until she has hit each window in each row, all without missing one shot. Although seemingly quite simple, she knows that it will be difficult with her injuries, but it is a good training exercise for aiming.

On her first try, she only gets to the third window on the first row before she misses. Then she tries again, failing once more on the first row. On her next attempt, she gets to the second row; then on the subsequent one, she messes up on the very first window. Eight continues trying, over and over, with little progress. At one point she reaches the third row, then loses it on the first window.

She is disappointed in her own abilities. Why can't she do it? It doesn't help that as she goes on, her arm only hurts more and more. Just squeezing the trigger is beginning to cause her pain. Yet she persists, adamant to try and succeed. She does it once more; still the third row. Then again, and again.

Pushing herself to be even half as good as she wants to be.

One more attempt. She readies herself before the building, getting into the perfect stance. She holds the Octoshot at her side, finger on the trigger. Then, she starts. Her aim is true on all the first windows, then all the windows on the second row, moving seamlessly between them and shooting right in the middle for each. She makes her way all the way to the final window on the fourth row, the farthest she has ever reached. She keeps going, determined, when she misses.

No, no, no, she thinks, this can't be it, she can't have ruined this. She keeps shooting at the window, over and over, but in her mind, the mistake can't be undone. She hits perfectly in the center but she keeps going, because this is something greater. In her most focused moment, she couldn't excel. Something always goes wrong with her. If she can't trust herself, who else could?

Then, when she pulls the trigger again, set to continue unleashing her anger upon the window, she feels a sharp, shooting pain in her wrist. She falls to her knees, dropping the Octoshot, and puts her hands up to her face. The pain is all throughout her body, almost electrifying. It slowly dissipates, but she doesn't want to stand up. She doesn't want to return to reality and face her own failures.

"Agent Eight? Are you ok?"

Eight turns around quickly and sees Three behind her, waving and hollering out at her. Eight gets up on her feet and walks slowly towards Three, grimacing at points from the pain in her legs.

"What happened? Was someone here? Why do you have the Octoshot?" questions Three. Eight simply signs out the word, "Train."

"You're training out here, so early in the morning?"

Eight nods.

"Why did you need to do that? You should be resting..."

Eight signs out "Sorry."

Three is surprised by this, quickly babbling out "No, no, I'm not mad! I was just worried for you. After yesterday, anything could happen!"

Eight signs out "Yesterday," "Sorry," and then "Why" and "Train."

Three worriedly asks her "Do you think I was disappointed in you yesterday?"

Eight responds with "No" and "Me."

Surprising Eight, and perhaps even Three herself, Agent Three quickly goes forward to hug Eight as soon as she finishes signing "Me," wrapping both arms around her torso and making sure not to hurt Eight's injured arms. Both of them immediately become flustered, but neither of them leave the hug.

"Eight… please don't be disappointed in yourself. You did everything you could, and sometimes you just need some help. That's why I'm here, and I always will be here. We're going to get you back to the surface no matter what." whispers Three into Eights ear

After what feels like minutes, they both leave the embrace, and Eight points towards the cable cars in the distance. "Do you feel fine enough to head over there?" asks Three, and Eight nods back. They begin walking over towards the horizon, Eight picking up the Octoshot as they pass it.

As they walk, Eight and Three stay glued together at each other's side, leaving no air between them. Both of them love being so close to one another.

Eight decides that she never wants to leave her friend's side, whether she is protecting Three or Three is protecting her. They'll be together forever. That's what friends are for, right?

Plus, the longer they stay together, the more chances she has to tell Three that she loves her.


	5. Memory

With a new objective in sight, Eight and Three decide to get going.

"Have you healed enough to walk all that way?"

"Yes", signs Eight

They begin to head toward what Three's compass identifies as North. Three notes that this is the same direction that they had been heading days ago when they crossed the bridge; in a way, they are completing their original journey as well as their new one.

Their path takes them across dozens of deprecated buildings, lying mostly straight up with some slanted.

"It's a surprise that these all remain standing in their tarnished state…" remarks Three

Indeed, it is a surprise. Some of them have large gashes in them, as if they were slashed with a sword, while others have craters or large, piercing holes. Most of the windows have been destroyed; the one Eight had been practicing on was an abnormality. The tops of some of them have even begun to slide off like butter, threatening to spill onto the ground below.

Of particular note to Three is how closely these structures resemble those of Inkopolis. She can see striking parallels between stout, destroyed buildings and the coffee shops that she frequented before becoming an Agent. These similarities only cause her to become more curious about this world, and of humans. If they enjoyed luxuries such as coffee just like Inklings - and Octolings - they might they also have enjoyed Turf Wars? Many questions have been left unanswered by time.

"This is just like what we have back home! Except, ours aren't as trashed as this."

"Home", signs Eight

Three doesn't quite understand Eight, because Three hadn't lived her first years of life as an Octoling. For Eight, the sight of these buildings isn't anywhere near as peculiar as it was for Three, because she had seen exactly this type of thing as a child. Octarians were very resourceful, and they made their nests in damaged and defunct human ruins like these.

Eight in particular had been born and raised in a tiny cottage near a sprawling human city that had been transformed into an Octarian army outpost many ages ago. Eight and her mother lived off of the land, scavenging amongst piles of rubble for spare parts, and sometimes, food.

Eight did not live in the city for a simple reason: her mother wanted to protect her from the military draft. All Octarians were required to enlist in the military at age 12, and being in the army was a dangerous life. Eight's mother couldn't take the risk, so after Eight was born from her tentacle, she took both of them to the countryside, building a cottage from scratch. Life was hard, but she knew her daughter would thank her for it eventually.

That day would never come.

One night, a squadron of Octolings swarmed the cottage, capturing Eight's mother while she was out scavenging. When she returned, she was given an ultimatum: join, or her mother dies. Her mother called out for her.

"It's okay, sweetie. I'll be okay. Do what I would want you to do."

Eight, Octoshot in hand, tried to fight. She ran at the Octolings, gunning away. She hadn't gotten much experience at shooting, since the scariest thing she ever had to fight was a small insect or too. But she knew that this was her only chance to live a happy life. She had to win.

She lost.

They captured her, destroyed her Octoshot. She never saw her mother again, and she never knew if she had been killed or not. In some ways, that was worse than knowing.

"Eight? Are you okay? Do you need to take a rest?"

Suddenly, Eight realizes that she has spent the last few minutes standing still, having let Three continue on without her.

She signs out "Fine", and "Thinking", then continues on.

Eight wishes that she could tell Three everything; her past, her fears, and… her appreciation, for Three. She deserved an explanation, after all. But Eight simply didn't know enough to tell her. After being rescued from the Deepsea Metro, Eight had begun to learn Inkling sign language alongside Three. In the army, they had never allowed her to learn Octarian sign language; according to the commanders, "hearing orders [was] enough." Only a couple months had passed after her rescue, so both of the Agents were still far from fluent.

Plus, now is not the time to explain everything to Three. As much as she wants to, signing is simply too painful at the moment, and there are more important things to do than go on angsty diatribes. Maybe in the future she would be able to tell her.

But she is tired of waiting for the future. She is tired of delaying happiness for the ones she loved, and for herself. She knows she can make things better now, if she tries hard enough. In this case, though, that is the only option.

Eight decides to stop thinking about the past, and focus on the present, mostly because she doesn't want to zone out again and embarrass herself in front of Three.

Eventually, the two partners come across a circular plaza at a junction between paths. Two LED TV's hang over the plaza; one is turned off, while another is on, displaying only static. The plaza is composed of two concentric rings paved with brick. In the center is a long, skinny, rectangular slit. Beneath the hanging TVs are small fountains without any running water.

"What the purpose of this place? Just to chill?" questions Three.

Eight signs "Not" and "Fun"

Suddenly, a loud screeching sound comes from the TV playing static, and a shape appears from out of the slit.

A new opponent.

This machine is made of a silvery steel, and is an almost perfectly flat square. It has two spindly, short arms, and two equally spindly legs that struggle to hold it up. Both of its sides have an image embedded onto them, depicting a static, mocking face that appears to have its tongue sticking out.

"Eight, watch out!"

This machine quickly shuffles along, scuttling like a crab, accelerating until it slides between Eight and Three before they can react. It then turns its body so that is perpendicular to their line of sight, obscuring Eight from Three and vice versa. As Three attempts to run around it, the machine turns and scuttles quickly enough to continue blocking her path.

"I can't get to you!"

Eight tries to sidestep the machine, but it is simply too quick. It takes both of their actions into account within milliseconds and is able to block them no matter how fast they move.

Although confusing, this situation does not seem dangerous; if anything, it is annoying. This changes when their opponent suddenly emits smoke before projecting multiple long spears out from each of its faces, where the mouth is drawn on, as if to imitate the tongue.

Then, without warning, it leaps in the direction of Eight, spears outstretched. She is only barely able to avoid it, dodging backwards from the attack. It then scuttles back, halfway between each of them again. It then repeats its attack on Three, who marginally avoids it.

"We need to do something, Eight!"

Agent Eight desperately wants to do something, anything, to save the both of them, but she is powerless. Even if she had an idea, she couldn't sign it to Three; her sight is blocked! The situation is hopeless. She is letting down Three again, and probably for the last time.

But on the other side of the machine, Three has an idea. She takes the Octoshot and shoots ink at the face she can see her, covering it with paint. Although it is not knocked back by the impact of the ink, the spears are blunted, and some sparks begin to fizzle. Even after inking the entirety of the face, however, it is still standing, and some of the ink soon begins to fade away. Luckily, she has an idea.

"Eight… catch!"

After yelling her warning to Eight, Three throws the Octoshot over her head and past the machine, landing it straight into Eight's arm. Without delay, Agent Eight starts shooting the side facing her, causing it to fizzle more and more. Just as it is going to be fully inked, their opponent leaps at Eight. Right before its longer spear impacts her, Eight fires her last shot at it, proving to be enough for it to fall to pieces in midair. Its various parts scatter around her without leaving a scratch.

Eight is in shock. She had yet again given up in despair, thinking the worst has happened. Yet in a seemingly impossible scenario, she managed to overcome, and in the process she saved her best friend, the one she loves most: Agent Three. Both of them are overcome with joy.

"Yes! You did it! I am so proud of you!" exclaims Three, who runs over and hugs Eight. They stay like that for what feels like a lifetime, neither of them wanting to leave the friendly, warm, tender embrace.

For once, it seems like the day would come for Eight. She believed they could work to tackle any challenge ahead of them. Now, Eight could see the future; one where she learns to sign perfectly; she can illustrate to Three her history, and she can show her what Octoling society is like. And maybe, like she decided before, she'll be able to tell Three all of the little things she loves about her. After all, there are so many!


	6. Loneliness

Agent Three and Eight walk for many miles after their battle against the side-stepping robot, passing countless numbers of dilapidated buildings but never another murderous machine. Eight begins to grow tired, but she knows that they are almost there. Freedom again.

"Eight, we're going to take a long break after this. No more missions for a while. You can enjoy yourself… and maybe I can come along, if you'd like. I'm sure they'll understand after all we went through" announces Three. Eight nods her head, smiling. Three has to look away to hide the emerald blush that spreads across her cheeks when she sees the look on Eight's face.

Finally, they make it to the far wall of the ravine, where the cable cars travel. They are within a few minutes walking distance from it when they notice the large, mechanical figure laying in front of the entrance to the cable.

"What is this?", ponders Three aloud. Eight doesn't begin to have a clue.

Both of them can tell that this is some sort of large mech, at least. It has a humanoid figure, including two arms, two legs, a torso, and a head. It's face is composed of a wide LED where the mouth should be, and is otherwise featureless. Its appendages are long and seemingly sturdy.

"This is creeping me out…"

Eight waves over to Three, who moves towards her, because she has found a placard near the base of where the creation is kneeling. The placard is a stand with a screen at the top. When either of the Agents focus their eyes on it, they begin to see a paragraph in the language of their choice; Three sees Inkling, while Eight sees Octoling, even though they are looking at the same screen. They attribute this to the advanced technology of their predecessors.

Agent Three begins to read the placard out loud, imitating a goofy, faux fancy voice to try and get a giggle out of Eight.

"Here lies the great beacon of our city, the MegaModel. It was created to replicate the perfect human forme; the forme which shines above all else on our planet, the ultimate design of life. In a testament to its perfection, we have performed the first SoulBond procedure, embedding the soul of our mayor, who commissioned the statue, into the MegaModel. Through this, he will last eons, a never ending reminder of our achievements"

"What a load of posh garbage!" exclaims Three, although Eight is seemingly unamused. She puts her fingers up to her chin, deep in thought. If it was meant to last eons, then how has it broken after just millineas? Sadly, she cannot convey this with her limited communication to Three at the moment. If only she was as skilled as that special sign!

After their amusement at the MegaModel ends, they begin to head towards the cable cars. When one of them reaches the bottom, it pauses momentarily, allowing both of them to get on. It then proceeds to move upwards, towards the top of the ravine.

The trip upwards is slow and leaves a lot of time to think.

"Look, Eight! You can see the whole ravine from up here… isn't it beautiful!"

Eight nods, then signs, "Happy" and "Safe". They both smile at one another. Eight wishes that she knew the sign for "Beautiful" so that she could respond something like, "You're the beautiful one," but she has no such luck.

As Agent Three looks at Eight smile, she feels another twang at her heartstrings. She is so cute, so pure, and so nice in every scenario. Three feels herself begin to blush again and looks out to the side, back at the ravine. Really, the whole scene is beautiful. All of the destroyed buildings, and from their current point, they can actually see the sunset happening at the surface. It's actually very romantic, she thinks. If only she had the bravery to tell Eight…

Suddenly, they can feel a rumble spread throughout the car.

A noise from below, of rocks crumbling.

"What was that?"

Silence.

A steel fingernail half the size of Eight smashes through the side of the car without warning, snagging Agent Eight, then dragging her out.

Screaming.

Then another hits the car, taking it with it as it exits the side of the ravine, before the car slides off and falls.

Falls to the ground. Collides with it.

Smash.

Agent 3 is barely clinging to consciousness as she claws her way out of the wreckage, then collapses to the ground. She reaches for her Octoshot, but is suddenly picked up, held between two large fingers. She sees another move towards her Octoshot and then slam into the ground, crushing the gun into pieces.

The turns to see the MegaModel, now standing tall, arm outstretched and holding onto Three. It moves and slams her against the wall of the ravine, but still holding on.

Suddenly, the light in his "mouth" begins to light up, and a piercing static noise immits from its head. After a few seconds, Three's ears pop, and she can instantaneously interpret the noise as being intelligible Inkling.

The machine is speaking to her.

"This is the first time I've seen one of you freaks, and you are just as disappointing as I thought you would be. Scratch that, you might be even worse than that. Can it even speak?"

Agent Three manages to squeak out, "Y-yes... Who are you…"

"You know that I am the MegaModel. I watched you read my plaque," it responds, "Really, I watched everything you did. I even knew you could talk, of course. I just wanted to watch you squirm!"

"W-why… did you do this…" she asks, meekly

"It is for your own sake. I see that you are weak now, just as weak as my kind was. We destroyed ourselves in puny wars. Do you know why? It is because we were meaningless. We simply lived to stay alive. We were lonely. Soon, all of us were completely isolated, doing as we were told without any say in the matter. Look at the buildings around us! Trashed, by people who didn't care, with people who didn't care inside. What did it matter to them if they lived or died? It was all the same!"

As the machine speaks, Three notices something moving on the ground, and tries to focus her eyes. Eventually, she realizes that it is Eight, crawling slowly.

By now, Three has completely tuned out the robot. All she cares about is Eight. If only Three had noticed sooner… she could have saved her. But she couldn't. Now all she hopes for is that Eight can crawl to get into another car, and leave her to die. She deserved it.

Wait.

Eight is crawling towards the robot?

Why?

"Are you even listening to me? Don't you care about what your conqueror has to say? I'd think you would find it vindicating to hear that your predecessors were just as much a failure as you are. Of course, that just means you deserve this fate all the same as they did. Dying alone, too afraid to CARE! Even if you did, you'd never even tell anyone… how pathetic. Keeping it all to yourself, because society would punish you if-"

"SHUT UP!" interrupts Three, angry. She is trying to distract the machine for as long as she can, to allow Eight to wise up and escape, even if she has to die, but she is also very, very angry. Because she does care.

In fact, if she is going to die, she might as well prove that she is different from the humans he was dissing.

She does care.

"I DO CARE!" she interjects again, knocking him off his guard once more.

"What? You try to LIE to me? How funny. Even as you face your death, you can't accept the truth. What do you have to lose?" it snickers out.

"I care! You're wrong. We Inklings, and Octolings, have strong relationships. My friends are always there for me, and I… I try to be there for them. And, and, its more than just that. I love my friends. And… I love, in the deepest sense of the word, my best friend. Eight. And I was going to tell her! I was going to tell her how much I thought about her smiling, and everything she has done for me, how she stays around me even when I mess up! But you RUINED it! And now I'm going to DIE before I can tell her! So how is that for caring?" she yells at him, her face burning red, from both anger and embarrassment.

Eight's face is red too, and despite everything that has happened, she is absolutely beaming. She can't believe what Three just said. Everything she ever wanted from that has come true. But right now, she has something important to do, and she knows that she can't fail now. She won't, though. That's what Agent Three showed her.

She can do it.

While Three continues to distract the MegaModel, Eight climbs atop one of its feet, then up into its leg chassis where its wires are stores. She knows exactly what to do, thanks to her time back in the Octarian Army.

"That's so cute… you have a little crush! But you have only validated my claim! You never told her, because you are weak! All of the people of this world are WEAK beyond belief! They deserved what they got, and so will you. So after I'm done with you, I'll go up there, and I'll rip to pieces every last single living being, until all the suffering in the world is gone, and only I remain. Only the perfect bei-"

Its voice is suddenly cut off, and the light of its mouth goes out. Then, its arms fall to its side and it begins to lean over, as if it had fallen asleep.

Eight has disconnected two cables running down its leg, cutting out the power supply for the entire machine. Without power, the whole robot has shut off entirely.

As its weight becomes too much for the legs to handle, the entire machine falls over backward, collapsing into the ground. Its plastic shell shatters, and its wires fizzle as they become disconnected and tattered.

Three falls, no longer supported by the robot.

She doesn't hit the ground.

She lands in Eight's arms.

Eight lets her down, and both of their faces become a deep red. Three begins stuttering, and mumbles out, "I-I, did you, did you hear what I said? I, I was just, uh, s-stalling, but I mean, uh, you're cute, and-". Eight cuts her off by leaning in and kissing her square on the lips.

Three feels like her face is going to explode, and her heart, and her entire body. In a good way.

She leans into the kiss, and wraps her arms around Eight. Eight wraps her arms around Three, and uses her finger to draw a heart on Three's back. That's close enough to what she wanted.

They stay that way for what feels like a lifetime.


	7. Hope

Sadly, they cannot hug forever.

Agent Three pulls away, temporarily locking eyes with Eight before looking away. She doesn't want to look her straight on mostly because she knows it makes Eight uncomfortable, but also because she's been blushing for minutes. In fact, Three bets that her entire face is red with embarrassment.

Turning away from Eight, she looks over towards the cable cars. Luckily, most of them have survived the attack, and remain running without issue.

"Uh… let's get going, over there. We can finally escape together" says Three, who begins walking slowly. Slow enough so that she can still hear Eight's footsteps, guaranteeing that she is following. She doesn't want to turn around and risk looking Eight in the face, risk having to question what had just happened.

Eight feels the same way.

They step over the mangled body of MegaModel, now totally defunct. His joints have fallen to pieces, allowing his appendages to separate from the torso. Where it had once been a living, mechanical being, it is now just another mess of destroyed human architecture, doomed to disintegrate over the coming millennia.

Three and Eight enter into another cable car, now certain that they would make it to the top. According to another auto-translating panel in the back of the car, the car would have to travel just over 10 minutes until they reached the service.

They spent that time in silence; Eight, of course, didn't have much a choice in that. Three opted not to break the silence, partially because she couldn't imagine anything she could possibly say that might justify what she said. Instead, she stared at the floor, begging for the trip up to be over.

Eight stared out of the car, towards the deep ravine they had escaped. She was deep in thought, wondering what Three might possibly be thinking. She was always terrible at trying to understand what was going on in other people's heads, but this seemed especially opaque. Should she have kissed her? Three had just declared her love for her, but… it was definitely a friend love. People said it all the time to one another.

Eight knew that Three had loved her for a while, in that platonic way. What had happened was hardly a revelation. Yet something felt different…. Eight easily chalked it up to her own inability to empathize with others. She hoped, for a second, that there was something deeper, even though the logical part of her, the part which really understood things and wasn't off, knew that it was nothing.

So why did she kiss her?

It was that stupid hope. Eight had _tricked_ herself for a moment, and she was about to do it again. Hadn't Three leaned into the kiss? Then she left it, pulled away from the moment, but only after _entire minutes_ had passed. If Three didn't want it, then why did she remain in the embrace, even after Eight had signed the heart onto her back?

No. She wouldn't be fooled again. Her emotions had tried to trick her, but they were weak. Perhaps broken. In reality, Three probably hated her more than ever. Everything that she had feared might happen in the impossible scenario where she confessed her full, romantic love had come true, and now Three hated her. Three wanted nothing to do with her. Otherwise, she would be saying something right now, and she would be excited. But she wasn't.

Eight takes a risk and looks right at Three, who luckily doesn't notice the attention. Eight tries to ascertain what Three is feeling using logical, visual cues. Her mouth is clearly a frown, and her eyes are droopy and closed. She had her elbows on her knees and her hands on her cheeks, resting her head against them.

In Eight's mind, it is obvious that Three is unhappy, due to the frown. Her closed eyes probably mean that she is deep in thought about something, since it is easier to concentrate with her eyes closed. She is also likely tired, as suggested by her trying to rest her head. None of these possibilities leave room for love or happiness.

So, her worst fears were right. Even after that embrace, Three is downtrodden. The affection that Eight had offered on a whim was a huge mistake that would crush her most important friendship.

After the long silence of the trip, their car finally made it all the way to the top of the ravine walls, and a loud "BING" noise came as a bell was struck, marking that they had arrived at their destination.

Three, having sat near the exit, gets up and leaves the car first, walking across a rickety, rusted iron pathway over to the ridge. She tries not to look down so as to not be instantly frightened at the miles long drop bellow. Eight soon follows suit, taking note of the creaking noises that sound off at every step.

Their arrival has lined up perfectly with the setting of the sun, which Three estimates as putting their current time at around 9pm, since they are in the middle of summer.

"We deserve a little break. Maybe we should… watch the sunset, together," says Three, breaking their silence. She then sits down on the ground, stretching her legs so that her feet are almost over the wall of the ravine. She pats next to her, and Eight sits down where she patted, bringing her knees up to her chest and wrapping her arms around them.

They both look towards the West, where the sun has just begun to set. The sky has turned a magnificent shade of orange, and is beginning to swell with colour, beckoning forth the night. As they watch, Eight begins to rock back and forth, overcome with feeling. Her eyes grow wet and she thinks about what just happened, how she almost just lost her life, and how she most certainly just entered an entirely new relationship with her best friend.

For now, she didn't know if it would be a good or a bad one. No matter what, things would be different. It was like the sun was setting on her life as it entered a new phase; the darkness of night like the uncertainty plaguing her mind, forbidding her from any sense of security or happiness. She wished that the sun would've stayed forever. Soon, the moisture in her eyes grows heavier, and a tear falls down her cheek, staining it.

Three turns to see her partner, her friend or maybe more, and notices her crying. She sees the tear run down her face before falling to the ground. Three doesn't know why Eight is sad after having finally escaped, but she does know that she deserves so much better. Just before another tear begins to fall, Three wraps her arm around Eight, pulling her tight and embracing her.

Eight leans her head on Three's shoulder, taking advantage of this change. They sit there together as the sun sets, lingering as the light disappears and they are left in darkness, illuminated only by the deteriorating street lights from a nearby road. Neither of them are sure where the future will take them, but they hope that they can be together for all of it.


End file.
